featuring · film for both print and online publications, and his work has been reviewed in...

Featuring:

Joan ChildsCarl ConradJudy DarleyRebecca DemarestLauren FreedmanStan HalesDamien HendleyElizabeth HoyleDoug MalletteIan RogersColleen Young

Fall 2013

Origami Journal Fall 2013 2

A Word from the Editors

What is it about the unseen; those things that haunt us, that give us goosebumps and shivers, and force us to question our understanding of reality? Both masters of horror and friends sharing ghost stories have been around for centuries with one, shared goal in mind: to thrill and to frighten.

For Origami’s horror-themed Fall 2013 edition, we contacted Canadian horror author Ian Rogers to give us a first-hand glimpse into the horror genre. We are so excited to share Ian’s expertise with all of our readers... and once again thank our wonderful contributors who truly made this issue terrifying.

So, turn out the lights, close all the curtains, and please enjoy our third installation of Origami Journal.


There’s an art to writing good horror fiction, but there’s also a balance. Horror is all about balance, and writing it is about placing your hand on the scale and tipping it. You can tip it a bit, or you can tip it a lot.

When I was asked to write the introduction for the fall issue of Origami, an issue devoted to horror, I thought that the best way to describe my own theories of the subject, the best way to explain the balance of horror, was to talk about something I both love and fear.

The woods.

Put simply, there’s no place I’d rather be during the day than the woods. But when the sun goes down, I can think of no place scarier.

Maybe it’s something to do with the trees. The way they seem to embody all of nature, and the way they conceal… well, just about anything. There’s something hauntingly beautiful about trees. David Lynch obviously understood this when he and Mark Frost created the TV show Twin Peaks. There’s even a spooky musical interlude in the series finale called “Sycamore Trees.”

When Jaws first hit theatres, there was a lot of talk about people are now afraid to go swimming in the ocean. I know because I was one of them. I vowed never to swim in the ocean again after watching that movie. I know the chances of being attacked by a shark are very low, but it doesn’t matter. Fear isn’t rational, and while the possibility of being attacked is low, it’s still a possibility.

Sharks never really bothered me much. In fact, I’m a big fan of Shark Week, and since I don’t live near the ocean, the fear of a shark attack is pretty low on my list of daily concerns. The woods, on the other hand, are all around us.

ForewordIAN ROGERS

>>


If Twin Peaks takes part of the blame for my fear of the woods, the rest belongs solely to the people who made The Blair Witch Project. I think a lot of people would say that movie did for the woods what Jaws did for the ocean.

Autumn is a time of balance in nature. It’s a period when things die or go to sleep for a while. And yet it’s also one of the most beautiful times of the year. The leaves change colour, the air turns cool and crisp. It’s almost like, for those few months, our world drifts into another dimension. At what other time is it socially acceptable for children to dress-up as monsters and go screaming through the night for candy? And what better example of the balance of horror is there than Halloween, that night of tricks and treats rooted in a history of pagan rituals and human sacrifice.

The stories you are about to read may be classified as horror or supernatural or thrillers, but they’re really about tipping the balance of everyday life. So go ahead, turn the page and get reading. Just make sure you’ve got something to hold onto. Or even better, someone.

>>

Foreword

Ian Rogers is a writer, photographer, artist, graphic designer, and web developer. At the age of twelve, his comic strip Styx & Stone was a regular feature of the Whitby Free Press. He has written extensively on film for both print and online publications, and his work has been reviewed in Entertainment Weekly. He has also worked in radio broadcasting as guest co-host of Strange Days... Indeed on NewsTalk 1010 CFRB Toronto, and as webmaster for the award-winning horror-fiction website Chizine.com. Ian’s short stories have been published in several markets including Cemetery Dance, On Spec, Broken Pencil, and Shadows & Tall Trees. His work has also been selected for The Best Horror of the Year. His novelette, “The House on Ashley Avenue,” was nominated for the Shirley Jackson Award.

Ian is the author of the Felix Renn series of supernatural-noirs (“supernoirturals”), including “Temporary Monsters,””The Ash Angels,” and “Black-Eyed Kids” from Burning Effigy Press. For more information about the series, visit TheBlackLands.com. Ian’s first book, a collection of dark fiction called Every House Is Haunted, is now available from ChiZine Publications. His second book, a collection of Felix Renn stories called SuperNOIRtural Tales, is available from Burning Effigy Press. Ian lives with his wife, Kathryn, in Peterborough, Ontario.


Table of Contents

EDITORIALLAURA ELEY & 2 A Word from the EditorsLORNA LONDON

IAN ROGERS 3 Foreword

FICTIONJOAN CHILDS 6 Trick or TreatCARL CONRAD 8 A Most Agonizing DeathJUDY DARLEY 12 Unwanted GuestsREBECCA DEMAREST 17 Rock-a-bye BabySTAN HALES 19 A Man and His LawnELIZABETH HOYLE 22 Mrs. Smalls SecretDOUG MALLETTE 25 Trot

PHOTOGRAPHYLAUREN FREEDMAN 28 DAMIEN HENDLEY 31 IAN ROGERS 34 COLLEEN YOUNG 41


It was Halloween night. I awoke to darkness. I’d been dreaming that I was driving in the dense fog, and had thumbed the defrost button on the dash of the old Chevy Silverado. Was I still dreaming? Given my penchant for sleepwalking, my disorientation was understandable. Comprehension cleared my head as the heater cleared the windshield, and in the moonlit night I could just make out that I’d turned down the driveway of the old abandoned Bosch Family Chapel. With my next breath I was being dragged inside the pitch black building, having instantly changed surroundings as so often happened in my dreams. I didn’t know if something had killed the nightlight in my bedroom, or if I was, in fact, still dreaming about the old haunted church.

It was the noise that clued me in. Or rather, the lack of noise. I lived in a busy rectory. Even late at night, there was always a priest mumbling devotions, a car driving past, or a dog barking. Now everything was dead silent. A rush of adrenaline took over my body like a personal sport’s trainer for my circulatory system. My blood raced through expanded blood vessels preparing me for fight or flight. Still, this could be a dream. They say you can’t feel pain in a dream, so I made a mistake. I pinched myself.

Pain is something you can describe with magniloquent prose, yet to put pain to paper fails to do justice to the exquisite amalgam of anguish and frenzy. While the reader merely sees the words on paper, the subject must physically endure every second of agony. That somnambulistic pinch coincided with the realization of pain, transforming my semi-conscious self into a fully awake, alert human animal.

I found myself anchored hand and foot to the top of the dilapidated alter in the old church, fighting unyielding bonds. Muted light filled the room as the full moon peered through a ragged hole in the far wall, a hole that had not been there in my dream. Standing over me loomed the naked form of a masculine creature of questionable human ancestry. He held the head of a jagged broken statue of the virgin mother which he was using to open my right inner thigh muscle, ripping up towards my groin.

My scream was uncompromising as every terror-rending atom coalesced into a wail that escaped past my tonsils, fruitlessly seeking sanctuary outside my pain wracked body. Cords of magenta slime popped free of the confines of my flesh as the edge of Mother Mary’s severed torso tore its way up my pant leg. My shriek distracted the creature, and the jagged edge stopped before reaching the crotch of my flannel PJ’s.

I gazed into his face; if it’s true that eyes are windows unto the soul, then the shades were open, the lights were on, and the devil was planning an orgy. As God’s warrior, I was not unused to looking into the face of evil, yet locking eyes with this thing will not be easily forgotten. His large, block-shaped head framed deep set features and stalks of silken grey strands wilted in the mulched bed of his scalp. Rows of craggy brown scars traversed his broad torso and he absent mindedly picked at them, leaving bloody nuggets of scab under his claw-like fingernails. My scream froze in my throat. If you have ever seen an African wildlife video, you are familiar with that look of resignation on the face of a wildebeest that has fallen prey to a pride of

Trick or TreatJOAN CHILDS

>>


lions as they eviscerate it, and feed on its bowels. I had that look now, and this creature knew it. Taking up the scabrous statue he reached toward my genitalia.

“Trick or treat, trick or treat!” Children’s voices came laughing nervously up the chapel walkway, unbidden, unexpected and astonishing. A booming adult voice claimed “I find your lack of faith disturbing. You don’t know the power of the Dark Side.” Astonished, I watched Darth Vadar escort a score of assorted super-heroes, goblins, and one particularly disturbing sponge-like creature into the vestibule.

The man-creature glanced back and lumbered to its feet. The evil in his eyes changed to fear, and he ran ape-like on all fours towards the open hole in the wall of the building.

Simultaneously, Darth Vadar’s league entered the hall. All frivolity ceased when they saw me bound to the alter. As the Sith Lord approached me, I passed out for the final time that night.

Days later, when I was released from the hospital, the police determined that I had suffered from an attack of somnambulism in which I had driven to the old church, where I was accosted by a vagrant. It is said that the Lord works in mysterious ways; I can attest to that truth. A group of trick-or-treaters had come to the chapel that night on a scavenger hunt. Darth Vadar was in fact an emergency room surgeon who saved me from bleeding to death. My severed femoral artery was repaired using a pixie straw and some thread from a Spiderman costume in a brilliant display of field medicine.

With the help of crutches and the confidence brought with the sunlight, I find myself back in this God-forsaken place. On the wall is a full size mural; a reproduction of Hieronymus Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights. There is no longer a hole in the wall. Where the hole had been, the naked form of a masculine creature of questionable human ancestry lounges on top of a wooden torture device. It locks eyes with me from the painting with an expression of evil I have never before seen and will not easily forget.

>>

Joan Childs grew up moving about the country with her family, in the military tradition, and eventually settled as an adult in Los Angeles, CA. She met her husband while working at a pet store, and they married in 1981. Joan went on to become a veterinary technician and animal control officer, then turned her hard won equestrian talents into a career as a professional horse trainer and riding coach.

In 2005, the Childs moved from Los Angeles, CA to West Tennessee. Joan is the owner and trainer at Finish Flag Farms, an equine training and retirement facility located between Memphis and Nashville. Joan has been happily married for 30 years and has two adult sons.

Trick or Treat


K-A-R-E-N... Even her name was like fingernails dragged across a chalkboard to me. When someone said it, all I could hear was an inglorious mixture of whining, bragging, lying, platitudes, excuses, phobias, and subversive agendas. There was nothing remunerating about her, nothing to offset the shallowness of her thoughts, the pettiness of her criticisms, and the selfishness of her attitude. It was all just a self-reflected glare. She was the centre of the universe, and everything else was just there to complete her world.

This was the woman my son had chosen to marry, and now they lived with us. But, it wasn’t as easy as all that. They didn’t just live with us. Because of her, they penetrated our lives like parasites. What we ate for meals, what we watched on the television, what was an acceptable hour to go to bed or when it was ok to move around and make noise in the morning, these were all considerations sanctioned or prohibited by K-A-R-E-N. Because she went to bed exceptionally late and slept in until nearly noon every day, those of us who kept more normal hours had to tiptoe around in an ever-cautious silence lest we disturb the sleeping beastess.

One morning, for instance, I was putting away some pots and pans that had been washed in the dishwasher and were now dry. I was merely putting them back in the cupboards where they belonged, but they clanged and echoed in a way that must have seemed like they were being beaten with a wooden spoon on New Year’s Eve. Of course, I wasn’t apologetic about it because I knew the only one it would disturb was K-A-R-E-N. She was the only one still sleeping. It was 10:30 in the morning, so I thought a little noise would be permissible. But you should have heard the indignant clatter that soon ensued in response.

As she emerged from her bedroom, which was to the side of the kitchen, the bright morning light shining through the windows spattered against her face in such a way that she cringed and squinted like Dracula exposed to a glistening cross.

“What’s all the noise?” she asked in disgust. “Is there a fire somewhere, and we have to escape?”

Of course there wasn’t a fire. There was only the indelicate sound of my trying to put things away so that we could start the day earlier than noon, but that motive was lost in the litany of invectives that were hurled ingloriously in the air like leaflets from a plane:

“...no consideration for those who went to bed late! ...no regard for others! ...deliberate attempt to wake me up! ...lack of understanding! ...making it difficult to sleep!...”

There was a whole cacophony of complaints that spewed from her mouth like vomit from a possessed demon. Then she looked me straight in the eyes with that scrunched up squint of hers, tossed her hair back indignantly, turned away from me with a huff, and stomped back into her bedroom, not to be seen again until an hour or so later.

A Most Agonizing DeathCARL CONRAD

>>


I was frozen by the brashness of her attack, but filled with an instant desire to rush into her room and strangle her or stab her repeatedly with a sharp knife. I could even picture in my mind her head exploding as I wound a ball of duct tape around her head then stuck a small stick of dynamite between her lips and lit it. BOOM! it would resonate. But the job would be done, and my world would be rid of its chief menace.

If hate is the strongest word humans can feel, then I must invent a new one because my disgust and revulsion go much farther than that. I not only hate her, but I wish to KILL her! And now I think I have a plan.

The city was cutting down trees in our neighbourhood, and they were using a wood chipper to mulch up all the loose branches. If I could just get her close enough to it while it was in operation, then somehow slip and push her into it while it was grinding tree branches into pulp, maybe I could do the world a favour and grind this human curse into a much more delightful sow’s ear.

The city work crew was only a few houses down from ours today as they started. They were topping trees as well as trimming dead and low-hanging branches all along the curbside. Karen and I were the only ones home at the moment, and I told her that she would have to move her car so the crew could trim some branches from in front of our house.

Of course she squawked and complained about it, but she got her keys and went outside. I followed her then, after she parked her car out of the way, I asked her if she would help me haul a small bush from alongside the house, and toss it into the wood chipper?

“What? You can’t just throw things in that machine,” she answered. “The workers won’t let you do it.” “I already asked them,” I replied. “They said that as long as the machine was free, I could do it. And I just have to get rid of that bush at the side of the house.”

She looked at me skeptically, but unaware of my more menacing plan. We walked over to the bush then, as the workmen moved away from the wood chipper and began working on other tree branches, I saw my opportunity.

“Come on, Karen,” I said quickly. “This is our opportunity.”

We both grabbed a side of the bush and began dragging it toward the wood chipper. The trouble was that she was on the wrong side of the bush. I slowed my pace a little and wrestled to get my side behind her so that she was between the bush and the machine, and I encouraged her to speed up.

>>

A Most Agonizing Death

>>


>>


“Yes. We’re almost there. Just a little farther. The machine’s still available.”

We could hear the grinding whir of the blades as they spun in relentless circles, the strong, sharp, spinning blades ready to tear whatever was pushed into the entrance of the machine into powder and dust. I maneuvered the shrub so that I was slowly but steadily pushing her back toward the machine. She seemed unaware of how I was steering her toward the spinning blades, and barely realized how close we were getting to the machine.

“We’re almost there,” I struggled to say as I pushed and guided the shrub toward the opening of the machine. We were almost there! “Lift up your end... push it into the machine,” I told her as my heart beat more rapidly and my eyes focused only on the wood chipper. Just a few more steps.

“Lift and... push!” I encouraged. Then I gave the shrub a hard and continuous push. I heard her yell: “Heeeyyyy... I’m st...”. She stumbled, felt the bush being pushed forcefully toward the entrance of the machine, then she noticed the danger and my intended motive.

“Nooo!” she screamed. But it was her last, anguished sound . She was pushed into the opening of the wood chipper and diced like a coleslaw salad. Blood sprayed everywhere from the opening of the chipper in a brief blast of skin and bones and shreds of clothing and hair sprayed in a steady stream onto the pile of wood chips in the back of the truck. It was a gruesome ending, but thorough, immediate, and complete. Quickly, the city workmen rushed around me, yelling instructions and asking questions.

“What happened?!!”... “Grab that shrub! Pull it back!” they yelled, but I continued to push it until all but a little stub of branches remained in my hands. There was nothing left. No shrub, no Karen, only the buzzsaw hum of the machine.

“What did you do?” someone asked, accusingly.

“I don’t know...” I stammered in false astonishment. “We were throwing away the shrub when... when she must have tripped or something... I couldn’t see... I couldn’t stop... Oh, how awful... She was my son’s wife... I’ll never be able to forgive myself...”

Through all the questions, explanations, accusations, and the horrified exasperation of those who talked to me about it, I maintained a contrite and helpless innocence that was convincing enough to obscure my more malevolent intentions. No one was really aware of how deep my contempt and resentment went. I always kept it to myself, only letting my true feelings foment in the hatred of my belly like poison. Finally >>


>>

Carl Conrad lives in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and is a retired college Economics instructor who enjoys writing of all types. He has published a children’s novel, a biography of a Christian southern gospel singer, many short stories and essays, and is now enjoying his days and nights as a freelance writer.


I had my retribution!

Because there was no direct evidence of premeditation, or even an extraneous murder weapon, all charges were soon dismissed against me. No one could believe that a person like me who had an impeccable history as a family man, a community contributor, a man who regularly attended church, who was well-liked by the friends and neighbors who knew me, and who was never known to have threatened Karen, or even spoken harshly to her, could have intentionally, and gruesomely, been the cause of this incident. But late at night, when everyone was in bed and everything in the house was still and somber, a wide, growing, unrepressed smirk of contentment covered my mouth like the blood a vampire must graciously brandish on its lips after feeding its lustful needs. I felt alive and exhilarated, and wanted to laugh as menacingly and vindictively as I could. But, I didn’t. I only wished, deep in my heart, that I could have been the one to push her off a cliff into the depths of Hell! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!


It’s early, really early – just after 5:30 a.m. – when Shaun comes to find me. I’m in the basement, still in my pajamas. I pause when he comes in, one leg half over the hairy old armchair that sits in the entrance to the section where the landlord’s dumped the former tenant’s possessions.

“Charlie, what are you…?”

“Did I wake you?” I ask. “Sorry. Couldn’t sleep. Thought I’d take a look. The stuff down here!”

I’ve found all kinds of things: old paintings, teddy bears, dressmaking fabrics, gymkhana ribbons… I wave one in the air, half amused, half aghast. “Why would anyone leave this stuff behind?”

“Charlie, I really don’t think…” He hesitates. “The landlord seemed to think she might come back for it, didn’t he? That’s why it has to stay in here – we can’t just chuck it all.”

“Oh, yeah, right.” I grin at him, feeling like a mischievous child. “But don’t you think it’s intriguing? What kind of person collects this sort of junk, and then leaves it behind? Look, there’s a lava lamp over there, and see all this old crockery!”

“Well, I once had a lava lamp,” he points out. “When I was at uni that counted as mood lighting. And most people have plates. I know, it’s weird that she left it, but can we go back to bed now?”

“You go, if you’re tired, sweetie. You need to go to work in a few hours. I don’t, do I?”

I realize that could have sounded like a jab, a reminder that it’s for him I’ve moved, for him I’ve left my job, my home.

“…and I’m wide awake now!” I continue, extra bright, and even blow him a kiss.

People always move for love or money, don’t they? Shaun moved for money, I moved for love. And like they say, a change is as good as a vacation. Better, in fact, because you don’t have to spend hours hanging around airports.

Shaun leaves for work at 8 a.m.

Trying to be proactive, I go through the job pages, phone four recruitment agencies, and email my résumé to a couple of companies. But it takes less than two hours, leaving me with most of the day still stretch ahead of me.

Unwanted GuestsJUDY DARLEY

>>


I spend hours unpacking boxes, trying to find homes for things – stupid things like cheese graters (why do we have more than one?) and stacks of old birthday cards. I take them out of their box and then get frozen by the uncertainty of whether we even need to keep them at all.

I open the cupboard beneath the sink at one point and find seven bottles of vodka lined up at the back of it. Seven! That’s weird, isn’t it? Three have been opened and drunk down a few inches. But why have so many? And why store them under the sink? There are masses of other cupboards and drawers in the kitchen.

When Shaun gets home I show him the troop of vodka bottles. He raises his eyebrows. “Maybe the old lodger was an alkie.” Then he sets about pouring the contents of all the open ones down the sink, saying: “She could have done anything with those bottles – laced them with something even.”

I feel a shiver go through me as I watch the liquid swirl down the drain, like all the sadness those bottles were supposed to dilute is welling up into the air instead, settling down over my head and shoulders.Shaun asks if I’ve been out today and I realize I haven’t. Must make sure I do tomorrow.

*In the night I’m woken by the sound of rain on the skylight over the landing. I slip out of bed and sit beneath in the splodges of moonlight and cloud-shadows, letting the noise slide into my head. Peaceful really. I must have dropped right off, because I open my eyes and there’s this woman crouched in front of me, staring at me with big, cat-like eyes. She seems a bit puzzled, but not unfriendly – more curious to find someone curled up on her landing in the middle of the night.

When morning comes, I go down to the basement and find the poor teds sitting in puddles of rainwater with their fur spiked in all directions. I find an old stripy jumper in one of the crates; so I bundle them up in that, bring the lot upstairs to stick in the washing machine. That way, at least when July comes for them, they’ll be looking their best!

That’s her name: July. Found out when a Horse & Pony magazine arrives for her in the post. Makes me imagine her always in sunshine, always getting ready to go for a ride on her favorite horse.Makes me find it hard to believe she’s an alcoholic, like Shaun reckons. I think she was just the type of person who liked to invite friends over for drinks. What’s wrong with that?

Still, I agree it’s odd, the way she’s hidden vodka bottles all round the place. When we go to shift the sad, sagging couch that’s slowly doing Shaun’s back in so we can bring in a new one, there’s a strange clunking noise. We carefully tip it up on end and out roll three bottles of vodka. One of them smashes on the ground, making the whole place stink. Should have seen the disapproving look on Shaun’s face!

I’ve barely seen him since we moved in though – his new job is eating up all his time. He sets off at 8am

>>

Unwanted Guests

>>


>>

Unwanted Guests

each day in his suit and tie, and often doesn’t get back till past 8 in the evening. Trying not to mind, trying to absorb myself in making the house nice and looking for work. Not that there seems to be anything anyway – get the sense Shaun thinks I’m not even trying.

I miss the office I used to work in with Jan and Nick and Clive, just the four of us doing our own little jobs. Here in the city, there only seem to be huge offices packed with people, and they don’t need me. Actually, I’m not sure Shaun does either.

*

Terrible day. Horrible. Awful. Stupid woman from the recruitment agency called and offered me a day’s work in a call centre. A call centre! My idea of hell. If I’d picked up the phone I’d have told her that myself but Shaun took it and said I’d do it! Shows how little he knows me.

Spend the morning surrounded by skinny twenty-somethings phoning up old people and trying to hard-sell them things they’ve never heard of. End up walking out just after midday, so I’m not even sure I’ll get paid.It takes me hours to find my way back to the house, and then I just want to have a good cry so I go into the basement, sit on the dusty steps all cuddled up in the stripy jumper I found down here a while ago.

When I stop sobbing I suddenly have the feeling of being watched. Raise my head ever so slowly and my heart nearly stops. There’s a woman sitting on the pile of old dressmaking materials right opposite me, gazing at me with cat-like eyes. I look at her, and then she smiles, and I smile back. She’s wearing a jumper just like mine, and I reckon we’ve got similar tastes.

By the time Shaun gets home I’m feeling pretty happy. Have even made a big veggie stew for us to eat together. Think he’s giving himself the credit for finally getting me out of the house, and I can’t see any reason to burst his bubble. I leave a bowl of stew at the bottom of the stairs for July. Wonder if she’ll be there again tomorrow.

*

Shaun’s working longer and longer hours, and when he is home he’s worse than useless. Like yesterday, it was Sunday so he was actually home for once. All of a sudden he got it into his head to go down to the basement and start looking through boxes.

I shouted at him to leave it alone and he said, all annoying and calm, like, “Look, Charlie, Julie won’t want half of this junk. We may as well get rid of it.” >>


>>

Unwanted Guests

So I yelled at him, “July, her name’s July, at least have the courtesy to get her name right!”Then he picked up a cardboard box of old toiletries – lotions, make up, whatever, and when I grabbed it off him the box broke and they spilled all over the ground. Why doesn’t he understand why this matters?

“Don’t you get it?’ I said. ‘Don’t you get that this is wrong? No women would leave these kind of things behind – something bad happened here!”

He gave up then, flung his hands up in the air and told me to keep the stuff if it means so much to me. I’ve taken to wearing one of the perfumes that was in the box, something sweet, comforting. Shaun says I don’t even smell like myself any more, but so what?

It’s better when he’s not here, really. That’s what July says, and I agree. We don’t need him. We curl up together in the basement on a pile of July’s old dressmaking materials and she tells me stories to make me giggle, make me laugh.

I go upstairs to put something in the oven for dinner, and catch sight of myself in the hall mirror – face smudged, hair wild – looking not at all like myself.

Go into the bathroom to clean myself up for Shaun, but just as I put in the plug and turn on the taps on my cell rings – him calling to say not to wait for him, he’ll be home late.

“What if he’s having an affair?” The words appear in my mind like they’re my own, but when I glance in the mirror, sure enough, there she is, cat-like eyes brimming with compassion.

“I’ve left some love for you here, behind the tub,” she says. That’s what she calls her bottles of vodka. Love. Clear and uncomplicated and just a little bit burning hot.

I slide into the steaming water, bottle in one hand, and let July love me. Someone should, after all, shouldn’t they?

*

At last. It’s taken long enough. As he carries his bags to the door, he looks at me, sad and puzzled like he doesn’t really recognize me.

He comes back towards me, kneels down in front of me, and I turn away.

“Charlie,” he says, “Just say the word. If you ask me to stay, I’ll stay.” >>


>>

Judy Darley is a British fiction writer and journalist with a dubious passion for overgrown Victorian cemeteries. Her debut short story collection, Remember Me To The Bees, will be out in Fall 2013. Find out more at SkyLightRain.com.

Unwanted Guests

I can hear July murmuring in my ear, mockingly: “Shaunie Shaunie Sexless Shaunie, just walk the walk – out the door, don’t come back here no more…”

I swallow a giggle and shake my head. “You’re not wanted here, Shaun,” I spit, and I can hear the venom in my voice. Shaun hears it too – I see him shiver minutely and feel bad for a moment, but July presses her hand against mine and I nod. “Go on, Shaun, leave. We don’t need you anyway.”

So he goes.

I moved here for love, didn’t I? And that’s exactly what I’ve found. Tucked in every alcove, in each shadowy corner – a pair of cat-like eyes and a smile just for me.


At four weeks, I knew I was pregnant. At five weeks, the ultrasound technician could find no trace of the child in my womb and asked if I could be mistaken. But then the blood test proved I was pregnant and the tech was forced to think outside the uterus. Eventually we found him, attached to the muscle wall of my abdomen, over by my liver. It’s ectopic, Ms. Mason, they kept saying. Dangerous. It probably wouldn’t last. I’d miscarry in a few weeks. They might have tried to move the fetus, but it was too close to my vital organs. Besides, the chance of it adhering properly to my uterine wall was so small... Leave it, I told them.

I scheduled a c-section for March fifteenth because I didn’t want him to have to share his birthday with St. Patrick’s Day. Plus it was a Friday, so it would give me the entire weekend to start recovering. I planned to go back to work as soon as possible. I worked from home anyway, freelance writing, while my partner had a job in a financial building downtown. I’d wish I could have said husband, but he had this thing against marriage.

Six weeks, and I was starting to feel quite a bit of pain. They offered to remove it, even tried to tell me it was in my best interest to abort the pregnancy. Kill my baby, they meant. Kill the child I thought I’d never have because my partner didn’t want one. At seven weeks, you could see the heartbeat as a flutter on the screen. At eight weeks, my partner got a vasectomy, saying he wanted to make sure this never happened again. At nine weeks, I told them to stop asking me whether I wouldn’t prefer an abortion.

After that, the pregnancy seemed almost normal, except that I started to walk hunched over from the pain, favoring my right side where my baby was growing. Most prospective mothers guard their wombs; I guarded my side, wrapping my arms protectively around my ribcage, leading with my left side down grocery aisles and through crowds.

At week sixteen, we couldn’t hear the heartbeat. Transvaginally, topically, no ultrasound could pick it up; they couldn’t hear it with a stethoscope or telephone or glass cup placed on my side like a child’s string phone. I cried when they told me it had died. They weren’t sure when, but sometime since my last check-up two weeks ago, its heartbeat had stopped. They told me they would have to cut it out, since it was now too big for my body to reabsorb naturally. Wait, I begged them, just a little bit longer. I wouldn’t believe that this was truly the end.

I put the surgery off for a week, and then two. And I noticed little things, like how I was still gaining weight, and how I still felt like I was carrying life inside of me, heavy and expectant. I didn’t feel like it was dead.

Especially when it moved. At first I wasn’t sure, but then there it was again, a solid kick to the kidneys. I called for my not-husband, made him feel my stomach, feel my side, watched the sadness in his eyes turn into confusion. He could feel it too, I knew it: our little ectopic miracle. Not dead at all, still

Rock-a-bye BabyREBECCA A. DEMAREST

>>


growing and thriving inside, against all the odds.

At week twenty-four, they still couldn’t find a heartbeat and they became quiet at the impression of a foot pressed against my skin. They couldn’t explain the fact that all their equipment said he was dead, yet I knew he was alive. I could tell because I was still craving, still glowing. To be sure, the cravings were changing. I found myself downing Tums as after-dinner mints, not for indigestion, but for the lovely chalky flavor of them. I couldn’t get enough dairy, milk fortified with extra calcium and vitamin D. I ate those chewable calcium supplements by the handful.

At week thirty, they asked if I had ever been diagnosed with pica as I snacked on whiteboard chalk. I asked them what that was and they said never mind, but I should probably stick to cheese sticks.

I could feel my baby growing heavier and I couldn’t really walk anymore. The bulge in my side had become so large I couldn’t sit in a chair with arms. I had to lie on my left side in bed; even my back was too painful. They insisted I stay in the hospital for the last six weeks of the pregnancy, until they were ready to cut the child out.

At week 34, I got out of bed to use the restroom, and I felt something tear inside me. The nurses ran in as I fell and they called for a crash cart, wheeling me to an operating room, sterile, white, out of focus.

At week thirty-four, they cut my baby out of me, shoving him at a nurse before they dove back into my abdomen, desperate to find the bleeding. When they stopped one gushing stream of blood, another appeared.

At week thirty-five, the little stone prince had lacerated my organs with all his kicking. Finally they closed me up and I demanded to see my son, my beautiful son, and at their nod the nurse brought him over, wrapped in a shroud of blue cotton. I pulled the fabric away from his face, waiting to hear him cry.

He was perfect. His skin was cooler than I expected, and hard. They were explaining how the body protects itself when it thinks a child is dead, how it calcifies the tissues to prevent damage to the mother. A lithopedion, they called him. I wasn’t listening. I was admiring the chalk white skin and the perfect little fingers and toes. He was heavy for being so small and I smiled up at them all.

I’ll name him Winston, I told them.

>>

Rock-a-bye Baby

Rebecca A. Demarest earned her MFA in Creative Writing from Emerson College in 2011 and has had pieces published in a few online journals, including Admit 2, Epiphany, and Terracotta Typewriter. She has a novel launching in March of 2014, excerpts of which can be found on her website:http://rebeccaademarest.com


The following are transcribed excerpts from handwritten notes found in the home of Bobby Deweese after the incident last Friday:

SUNDAY

I’m just going to write this stuff down for my own record so that once I figure out what’s going on, these notes will make every bit of sense like they should - especially if someone is messing with me. I’ll find out who it is.

I mowed the front yard yesterday evening, exactly the same way I do every time. I didn’t fertilize or do anything special to the grass. This was just to get ready for digging the trenches for the sprinkler lines today. When I saw the lawn this morning, it had grown back. The grass, I mean, like it had never been mowed. This is impossible. It has to be a prank that someone pulled, but I don’t know how they did it. Some damn growth spray? I looked around to see if the pranksters were anywhere near, waiting for my reaction, but no one else was in sight.

Today, I’m going to mow it again and dig the trenches. I’ve got all week to get the sprinkler system installed. No problem, right?

MONDAY

This morning I awoke to find that the goddamn trenches I dug had been filled in. Filled in with grass grown over them and no sign of any of the digging I had done. I couldn’t even find the loose dirt that the bastards used to fill them in with! They couldn’t have used mine because I hauled away all of the dirt I dug yesterday. But at least the grass still looked mowed. I didn’t hear anyone in the yard last night, so whoever it is was a quiet son of a bitch. While I was standing there, staring at the lawn, my neighbor Jack walked up and asked what happened to the trenches. I asked if he’d seen or heard anyone sneaking around the place. He said he didn’t, but that he would keep an eye out for me.

As we walked on the grass, we heard a low hissing sound and thought it must be a snake. Well, I heard it, but Jack says he didn’t. We both stopped moving and looked around and didn’t see a damn thing. After going back inside, I called the police to see if any kind of property damage investigation could be done. After hearing my story about the yard and how it ended up repaired and undamaged, they refused to come down and see for themselves since I had no proof and no true damage was evident.

So I grabbed my camera to go take a picture of the yard. When I got outside the grass had grown again. Instantly. To the height that it was before being mowed. I had been gone less than ten minutes and this happened. Less than ten minutes.

A Man and His LawnSTAN HALES

>>


I took a picture, (mainly for proof that I wasn’t crazy), and went to try buying a security camera to monitor the yard overnight. They were way too expensive, so I’ve decided that I will mow the yard again and hammer some stakes into the lawn to see if they stay up tonight. I’m also going to sit out in the yard and watch the entire night.

TUESDAY

I stayed up all night in the yard and didn’t fall asleep for more than a minute or two at a time. By the time the sunlight was bright enough to see the grass, I simply couldn’t believe that it had happened again. The stakes were nowhere to be seen and the grass was tall as ever. I took another picture and now I’m sitting in the yard writing this note. I’ve been staring for a couple of hours now and haven’t slept yet. This is so goddamn frustrating. I think I’m going to start pulling up the grass by hand and keep watch again overnight.

WEDNESDAY

Last night, I fell asleep in the middle of the yard. It must have been after three in the morning when I passed out, but I awoke this morning to find myself tangled up in the weeds and grass, which were now so tall that they reached my waist. It was also full of grass burrs that poked and stabbed me with their spines as I fought to get out of the yard. I was so sleepy that I thought I might still be dreaming. I went inside and got the camera for another picture of the growth, then drove to the tool store. I almost got into a wreck on the way after I dozed off for a few seconds driving. I bought a machete and came back home. Now my allergies are going crazy and driving me mad. I’m going to take the blade out and hack at the yard, and then I’m going to dig up the grass with my shovel. All of it.

THURSDAY Everything I did to the yard has been reversed again. Nothing stuck. All the grass is back. The weeds are back. I can almost hear them singing to me. I don’t know why. This is insane. I’m going to stay inside today and think of something…anything.

FRIDAY I know what to do. I’m going to burn it. I’m going to burn it all away.

The following is an excerpt from an article in the local paper about the incident that occurred last Friday:The man, identified as 53-year old Bobby Deweese, vanished into the 200-feet deep sinkhole instantly, according to one witness.

>>

A Man and His Lawn

>>


>> “Bobby was out in his yard pouring what I thought was chemical weed killer on his lawn; but then I saw him step back and light it up,” neighbor Jack Spence recalls. “The whole yard was ablaze and Bobby was just standing there, staring at it with a smile on his face. That’s when the ground opened up. He was gone in an instant. I still can’t believe what I saw.”

City and emergency service officials are still unsure of what caused the sinkhole collapse. “The diameter is so narrow and irregularly shaped. The overburden and bedrock beneath the ground around it show no signs of the displacement we would normally see in a sinkhole like this,” says geologist Kathy Choate. “It’s alarming.”

“He had been having major trouble with his lawn,” Spence says. “It’s like he had enough and just decided to open it up.”

Born in Fort Worth, TX, Stan Hales is a fiend for film and vintage pulp magazine covers, as well as creepy stories and Halloween. He also strongly believes that staying creative is key in life. Having spent quality time at Texas State in San Marcos, he now lives in Austin, TX with the ultimate goal of completing more writing and filmmaking projects.

A Man and His Lawn


My first day as an elderly living assistant and I’m already off to see my first patient, a Mrs. Josephine Small. I turn onto Park Lane, keeping an eye out for the house my boss’s directions tell me is hers. My fingers tap the steering wheel to the rhythm of the Beatle’s Blue Album that’s blasting out of my car’s long-suffering speaker system. If I’ve read my boss’s cramped writing correctly, this should be it. I pull into the driveway, cut the engine, and get out, hoisting my bag of medical supplies over my shoulder. It’s a relatively tiny house, all one level, with a rather forlorn-looking picture window overseeing a lawn that looks like it hasn’t been mowed in some time.

I walk over to the door and knock, unable to stop my hands from shaking as I do. Not only am I nervous because it’s my first day but because Mrs. Small is notorious amongst the patients of Sunrise Health, the small healthcare company I work for. All six who have ever gone to work with her have quit, leaving the company with nothing but a stiffly typed resignation letter. I only hope I make a good impression; I’m too buried in student loans to quit now. A stooped, wizened old lady clutching a walker for support answers the door, her huge glasses making her seem owlish.

“Hi, Mrs. Small, I’m Nellie Blythe from Sunrise Health and I’m your new assistant,” I say, trying to sound pleasant. Mrs. Small sizes me up and gives me a toothy grin.

“You’ll do very well, dear,” she declares in a grandmotherly drawl. “Please come in.”

“Thank you.” I follow patiently behind her as she wobbles from the entrance area to a diminutive living room where she’s taken the trouble to arrange tea for the two of us, as if I were a proper guest rather than an assistant paid to take her vital signs and do light house work. The thought touches me. She sees my smile and returns it.

“I wanted to welcome my new assistant, especially after all the trouble I seem to have caused.” I hear a loud thump from below. “Don’t worry about that,” she responds when I shoot her a questioning look. “It’s just Gypsy, my cat, puttering around the basement. I suspect he’s caught a mouse.”

She settles herself in an armchair and the appointment goes smoothly. She lets me take her vitals and lead her through a few exercises without complaint. She answers my medical questions with the practiced descriptions long-term patients develop. I make sure she takes her medicine and, since she has no other work for me to do, I sit down and have a cup of tea with her. The talk quickly turns to her family. “My husband Bill died over twenty years ago now,” she tells me with a wistful glance at a picture on a side table. “And my sons John, Joe and Andrew are all too busy to come and see me that often.”

I take another sip of tea, feeling drowsy. There are more thumps from downstairs and Mrs. Small

Mrs. Small’s SecretELIZABETH HOYLE

>>


bangs her foot on the floor a few times.

“Damn cat,” she says once all is silent. “I love that furball but he can be a handful.” She shoots an annoyed look at the door in the corner, which is padlocked.

“Do you want me to go and bring him up here?” I ask, already sitting up.

“No, Miss Blythe, he’s not bothering anybody. Have another cup of tea.” She refills my cup and it’s only then that I realize she isn’t drinking any.

“Don’t you want any tea?”

“No, dear, this particular blend doesn’t agree with me.”

There is a slight pause. I take another sip and yawn. I don’t know why I’m feeling so tired.

“So as I was saying earlier, I don’t see my children and my grandkids too much. I even used to relish the times Donny Mays from down the street used to come up and mow my lawn, if it only meant that I could talk to someone.”

“Haven’t you heard?” I say, forcing myself to sit up straighter. “He’s been missing for about a month now.”

Mrs. Small nods, tears in her beady eyes. “I know. I pray every night that they find him soon. He was such a nice boy.”

It goes quiet again and I hear wind chimes on the back porch colliding with one another in the spring breeze.

“That’s the thing they never tell you about gettin’ old,” Mrs. Small muses, fiddling with the drawstring of her pants. “They never mention how lonely it is. How you crave another’s company and how you don’t want people to leave when it’s time for them to go.”

I give her a bleary smile, trying not to fall asleep in this comfortable chair.

“Well, I’m here and I’m not going anywhere.” Her intense gaze sets off alarm bells in my head, though I don’t know why.

“No,” she says simply. “You’re not.”

>>

Mrs. Small’s Secret

>>


>> There is thumping again from downstairs, steady as a beating heart. Before I know what’s happening, Mrs. Small is standing and walking towards me without the assistance of her walker. She pulls me up, quite strong for such a fragile woman, and I stumble behind her as she leads me to the basement door. She turns the key in the padlock and pushes me down the first few steps. At the bottom I see not a cat chasing mice, but the gagged figures of Donny Mays and my coworkers chained to the walls, desperately staring back at me. I know what I must do, but my body won’t let me for I am too exhausted. I take out my cell phone but she snatches it away quick as lightning.

“I’m sorry, Miss Blythe, but I don’t ever want to be alone again. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a resignation letter to write.”

Those are the last words Mrs. Small says to me before the darkness engulfs me and all I hear is the rattle of steel chains.

Mrs. Small’s Secret

Elizabeth Hoyle has been writing stories since she was eight-years-old and is currently earning her Bachelor’s of both English Writing and Theology from Franciscan University of Steubenville. A native of Beckley, West Virginia, her fiction has been featured on flashfictionworld.com and her poetry has been included in the American Library of Poetry’s student anthology entitled “Talented”. She also keeps a somewhat opinionated literature blog at: http://literaryparaphernalia.blogspot.com/


Trot’s eyes open to the all too familiar scream of his alarm clock, its face flashing 7:00 a.m. He pulls the sheets back and swings his feet, clad in scuffed dress shoes, over the bed’s edge. It was a long night. He stands and rolls his neck side to side; the bones lightly pop in protest.

What the hell did I do last night? - He’d think, if he could.

Trot wears a business suit, dressed to impress, complete with a scarlet tie because a magazine once told him red was a power colour. The suit’s a smoky charcoal with pin stripes, deeply wrinkled from the night’s rest and covered in dark red stains. From a distance the stains could be mistaken for strawberry jam, but on closer inspection the clumps of hair and bits of flesh would be hard to miss.

A man is only as good as his suit. - Trot would believe, were he able.

Trot heads to the bathroom and glances in the mirror above the sink. The handsome man that once greeted him every morning didn’t show up today. Trot turns away from the stranger and fumbles with the shower handles. He steps into water that’s yet to warm and stands rigid, letting the cold water spray his upturned face and drench his dry-clean-only suit.

Across town an armored truck, impregnated with a dozen men in riot gear, rolls steadily in the direction of Trot’s quiet neighbourhood.

The shower finally warms up and begins the task of removing the red stains from Trot’s suit, sending them in a spiral down the drain.

He steps out, ignores the towels and walks through his home, his soaked suit leaving pale pink splotches along the carpet.

I should have hardwood put in. - He’d say to himself, if possible.

Trot steps outside into the warm morning air, into the bright sunshine of a beautiful day. His stomach rumbles, crying for the breakfast he’s yet to eat.

He walks onto his lawn. It was once well-kept but now the grass has grown long. Just next door, Mr. Peterson stands on his own lawn, hose in hand, watering his grass. The water pours from the hose, adding to a large puddle that expands under his feet. Mr. Peterson stares dumbly ahead, not bothered by his self-made lagoon.

Trot watches his neighbour awhile in curious wonder before being startled by a loud gun shot.

TrotDOUG MALLETTE

>>


A bullet crashes through Mr. Peterson’s forehead, exiting the back of his head in an explosion of skull and brain matter. He crumples facedown in his flooded yard.

Holy Shit! - Trot would shout, if that was an option.

Confused, Trot moves around his home, hoping to find safety in his backyard. Turning the corner to the back, Trot is greeted by the ominous black eye of a gun barrel. The barrel is attached to a large rifle, which is gripped by a grinning kid. The kid wears heavy protective padding on his chest and arm. ‘KILL TEAM 6’ is printed sloppily on his vest in bold yellow letters. The kid’s smile widens.

“See you in Hell,” he says, before pulling the trigger. There’s a dull ‘click’ but no bang. The kid figures forgetting to turn the safety off is probably the last mistake he’ll ever make – Trot makes sure of it.

Arms out, he lunges toward the kid, practically falling on him in his eagerness. Trot’s mouth finds the kid’s exposed neck. He bites down and tears away a hearty chunk of flesh from his would-be assassin’s throat.

The kid pulls free, staring in disbelief at Trot.

I can’t believe this is how it ends. And I was such a badass. - The kid would proclaim, were most of his neck not in Trot’s mouth.

Blood pumps generously from the wound. The kid clutches his throat in a feeble attempt to hold his life in. He tries to step away but trips on his own feet and falls to his back, dropping his rifle and chance of survival.

Trot chews the piece of flesh, savoring its warmth, enjoying the challenge of swallowing the gristly meat. But his hunger isn’t quite satisfied yet – the small taste has only intensified his craving.

This time he really does fall on the kid, who digs his heels in the ground in an attempt to escape. Trot works his hands under the protective vest and finds soft flesh. He digs his fingers deep into the horrified kid’s stomach, searching for a tastier treat. The kid offers only unintelligible gurgles as Trot wraps his hands around spongy intestines and begins to pull.

Trot works quickly, pulling intestines hand over hand like a homicidal magician pulling handkerchiefs from his fist. The young man sees nearly six feet of himself pulled from beneath his vest before his head drops back in a permanent sleep.

Trot reaches the end of the intestines and gives a final jerk to rip them free. And just in time, as

>>

Trot

>>


>>

Trot

Mrs. Peterson soon makes an appearance. She lumbers slowly, her remaining eye staring wildly down at the kid’s corpse. Before her untimely death, she had been so beautiful, lusted after by every man on the street. Now her face is long decayed, worms squirm hungrily in an empty eye socket, and the flesh of her once-perfect legs hangs in flaps like dried clay. She kneels on all fours next to the corpse and begins to gnaw greedily at his face.

Others soon arrive, hoping for a scrap. Trot looks back at the corpse before heading into his home, his dinner filling his arms.

Welcome to the neighbourhood. - Trot would say, if he cared.

Doug Mallette currently lives in Southern California where he continues to write short fiction as well as develop films alongside his partners at Untrademarked Productions. Untrademarked recently premiered ‘Worm’ - their first feature-length film.http://untrademarkedproductions.com/


PHOTOGRAPHY BY LAUREN FREEDMAN

“I delight in what I fear” - Shirley Jackson



https://www.facebook.com/lalalaurenphotography


PHOTOGRAPHY BY DAMIEN HENDLEY

“None of us really changes over time. We only become more fully what we are.” - Anne Rice



https://www.facebook.com/DeadlyPhotography


PHOTOGRAPHY BY IAN ROGERS

“We make up horrors to help us cope with the real ones.” - Stephen King



http://onemoreshadow.com/


PHOTOGRAPHY BY COLLEEN YOUNG

“Searchers after horror haunt strange, far places.“ - H. P. Lovecraft


PHOTOGRAPHY BY COLLEEN YOUNG

http://www.mescolephotography.com/

Fall 2013

www.origamijournal.com

Layout by DesignBouquet

featuring · film for both print and online publications, and his work has been reviewed in...

Documents